the tales and trials of a twenty-something

Category Archives: College Life

My friend once told me that he knew this guy that was applying to Harvard, and one of the supplemental questions read, “What is the riskiest thing you’ve ever done.” The kid filled out the question in red crayon and wrote, “This is the riskiest thing I’ve ever done.” I would have written skydiving or getting a free tattoo. Then again, he went to Harvard and well, I didn’t. No regrets.

Wow the New Year! Big things are happening. My apartment smells like New Years Day – stale sex and Fritos. In my last post, I talked about how life would feel more balanced once my adult life retained certain parts of my college life. Well, considered me balanced. I’m sitting on my living room* on my carpet** next to our Christmas tree typing this blog post while listening in on the profound conversational stylings of my 5 guy friends (two of whom are my roommates, one of whom is my ex-boyfriend):

Gabe: We shouldn’t be shit heads today

Collective groan

Nathan: I don’t know whose jacket this is but I’m snuggling with it

Gabe: Don’t cum on it, Nathan

Ezra: Who wants to see Les Mis?

Tyler: We should go bowling. We should go skeet shooting.

Gabe: I’m making us dinner reservations.

Tyler: We should play ping-pong…

And so on and so forth. This is my life.

I woke up this morning with my best friend in my bed, wearing the same dress she was wearing last night. When I opened my eyes she asked, “Why is this part of the bed wet?” I didn’t respond and went back to sleep. Three hours later, I wake up again, walk into my living room to find the previously mentioned guys – one on the recliner, one on the couch and one sleeping upright.

One of my roommates kept some of us awake with some ungodly sex noises last night/this morning. “It was like National Geographic but I couldn’t change the channel,” recalled Ezra. I decided that he owed all seven of us a nice bagel shmorgishborg for breakfast.

Currently, the boys and myself are each holding a piece of paper with a number on it. The number represents our spot in line for the shower. My roommate and his lady friend just finished their shower. As we all turned to look at them take the walk back to his bedroom*** Gabe said, “Only judgments await you out here!”

I don’t think this group is going anywhere today.

2013 is feeling a lot like college. The New Year has thus far kicked off with a promising start.

* You have to form a single file line if more than one person plans on walking through it

**Our carpet is actually those foam puzzle pieces that day cares use because they’re easy to clean/remove when a two year old pees on it. We have it for the same reason.

*** We converted our actual living room into a bedroom, so the only things separating our makeshift living room from his bedroom, are a bookshelf and a curtain. Both have proven to be ineffective as noise barriers.

Midway through high school, volleyball quickly consumed my life. Every other weekday and most weekends were spent at practice and tournaments. Yes, this did take a toll on the thriving social life I was cultivating (on Long Island…), but sacrifices had to be made. Naturally, I wanted to continue this lifestyle in college.

Fast-forward to first day freshmen year of college. I arrived a few weeks early for volleyball. The campus was nearly empty except for the fall season athletes and the weirdos going on an outdoor adventure trip (still REALLY jealous). I said sayonara to my family and headed to my first practice. The exhaustion that overwhelmed my body was suffocating.

Three weeks later, when the crippling soreness faded and my sight was restored, I saw that college was wonderful. The rest of the students arrived on campus and suddenly there was free stuff everywhere! T-shirts, posters, water bottles, tote bags, key chains, rape whistles, you name it! College was turning out to be great! I had a cafeteria that fed me, a custodial staff that refilled the toilet paper, a job as part of my financial aid package, and I had at least 20 friends within a 10-foot radius.

However, like my aching muscles, my excitement over these $52,000 free gifts faded as well. I thought that college was going to just hand me my independence – turns out I was going to have to find it on my own.

Fast-forward to first day freshman year of life. Independence bitch-slapped me in the face and then sucker-punched me in the gut. When discussing the transition from college to “the real world,” I like to compare it to a babysitter playing peek-a-boo with a baby (I’m the baby). This is no typical game of peek-a-boo though. When the babysitter pulls his/her hands back to playfully shout “Peek-a-boo” you, instead, see the devil’s head up in flames roaring at you saying “GET A JOB” and then you cry…you cry a lot.

There’s no free rape whistles here in the real world. There’s no cafeteria waiting to feed me, and there’s definitely no custodian waiting to refill the toilet paper in the bathroom. Living with two boys, I’ve found the toilet paper on top of the roll, underneath the roll, on top of the toilet, to the right of the toilet, or just not at all. I maybe have 6 friends within 2 miles (including my dad and my step-mom), and finally, the real world definitely does not hand you a job just because you’re in need of financial aid.

These days, I’m rarely sore from exercise and free stuff isn’t being thrown my way. So pretty much, the real world is starting off the exact opposite of how college did. With that, I can only assume that like college, adult life will too balance out. Rather than having an anxiety attack over the overwhelming amount of independence I now have, I’m either going to take on more responsibility or just say fuck it and travel. Who knows? Probably fuck it and travel though.